


Almost Better

by Angelicalangie



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-06
Updated: 2011-04-06
Packaged: 2017-10-17 16:12:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/178615
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Angelicalangie/pseuds/Angelicalangie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes flight helps her understand where she wants to be, and where she has been before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Almost Better

She sat in her viper and felt the strangely comfortable hardness of her ejector seat. She went through her preflight checks, working her way through the familiar list of checks, hydraulics, electrics, gyroscope, on-board computer, artificial horizon, oxygen, oxygen reserve, fuel, altimeter, communications, she even checked her harness looking over what she can see to make sure there is no fraying. Once she is satisfied the board is green she relaxed, though the frisson of exhilaration at getting out of Galactica for a few hours ran through her

She has a few minutes before she is actually due to be towed by one of the Chief's knuckle draggers to the launch bay. She sits back and allows her mind to drift. She finds herself back at the Academy, the new Mark VII viper having just been approved for training she sought one out and climbed in, performed the usual preflight and after gaining clearance from the tower she took of evaluating every twist and turn.

She took it high into the atmosphere and turned her nose down, at an angle to make a spiral spin before pulling up and into a barrel roll and increasing speed at the end into a loop the loop. She pulled the bird left and right, giving the ailerons a solid work out before making a solid pull upwards once more and just flying in a straight line amongst the blue and white of the spring morning sky and even flew inverted for a while.

The sky was her friend whilst she was up amongst the clouds, it was her faithful lover and dance partner. It was the only time she ever felt free and unfettered. It was the place she could think about where her life was going, and the only place her mother's voice never even bothered her. This she thought, is what being normal feels like.

On the ground it all comes rushing back and she pulls her walls up once more. She looks over the body of the Viper once more, looking it over for anything she didn't like the look of, even testing the left aileron, making sure it wasn't as sluggish as she felt it was. Running her hands over the bird she felt an affinity for the plane, looking at it she even had a sense of its beauty and power.

“So lieutenant, are you going to name it?” A cocky voice speaks up, and she turns to catch cocky blue eyes and a cheeky grin.

“It's an inanimate object with a name already, Lee.” She finally says, hand still running along the body of the plane.

“So you say Kara, so you say.” He looked at the Viper once more. “So this is the infamous Mark VII eh, what's your verdict?”

“Its an improvement on the last one, it has better maneuverability, quicker reaction speeds and the computer systems are a bit more responsive too. Flying him is almost better than sex.” Her hand gently strokes as she smiles.

“Sounds like you haven't had the best yet.” Lee murmurs, looking at his brothers, severely off-limits, girlfriend.

Her attention snaps back to reality and she is in the launch bay, ready to be released She looks out of her left side cockpit window and gives her nod and she begins moving at whiplash inducing speed, feeling the g-forces flow through her pulling her into her seat. This is the bit the child in her loves, it reminds her of the time her father took her on a roller coaster, one of her better childhood memories.

Scant seconds latter the g-forces disappear suddenly and she is in the darkness of space with only her helmets lights and the on-board systems lights for illumination. It is only CAP that she is flying, its been days since the last Cylon attack and so it is a show of reassurance for the civilians as well as an advance warning on any scouts in the area. It was a different sense of flying in zero gravity. It was far removed from that within atmosphere, with gravity making twists and turns more precarious. She didn't know though, which one she liked more. They both had the pros and cons, and both evened out in the grand scheme of things. It was flying that she realized that she was her most true to herself.

CAP was a four hour stint, she took her time with it, giving a fly past almost all of the ships, but her mind was not on the flight today, her mind was still caught up in the past, on Lee's comment those years ago. “Sounds like you haven't had the best yet.” She had always had something for Lee, right from opening the door. It was like a freight train smacking into her. “Sounds like you haven't had the best yet.” What was that, the worst come on in history? And yet it seemed to have worked because she had heard it then and apparently was still hearing it now.

Nothing was going on out there, her clock told her five minutes left of her CAP shift, her stomach was informing her of its hunger, not to mention her ass was informing her that it was about to start having dreams of its own.

“Galactica to Starbuck, time to catch the ball.” Dee's voice spoke over the communications channel clear and authoritative. Kara grinned, plans already forming.

“Ball catching commencing Galactica” She landed the bird with an effortless grace, there were going to be no divots in the deck for Tyrol to deal with from her. She smiled at him as he went to inspect the Viper and rolled her shoulders, stretching her legs as she walked.

Walking through the hatch she walked through the corridors to the officers mess, grabbed herself some lunch and some extras and walked back out. Walking through the corridors she had time to reevaluate what she was about to do, but she wouldn't let any of the voices of the past talk her out this time. He had made it patently clear both then and recently how he felt. She knocked on the CAG officers hatch and waited.

“Whatever it is, it better be a damn good reason to knock on my hatch!” Came the iritated and some was grumpy voice from within. Taking it as her cue she one handedly opened the hatch and stepped in. “What did you do this time Kara.”

“And a nice cheery hello to you too Happy.” She moved closer to his desk noting the piles of reviews that seemed to slowly be building a tower around him “No, nothing has happened, no fights with superior assholes, no decked deck hands, nothing wrong on the CAP, in fact it has been a very uneventful day. However since my stomach was reminding me of its existence, I thought, considering how much you seem to love your paperwork, yours may be as well.”

Lee looked at her considering the enigma that was Kara “Starbuck” Thrace. He had a distinct feeling that there was something going on, that her mind was whirring its machinations, and that he was a part of those plans. Still he smiled. “Thank you. Its been a busy day and the paperwork never goes away. I could spend the next four days awake and not even make a dent.”

“You could always forgo all those flight reports for the cap, or insist on verbal reports.” A trace of hope was apparent in her voice, the reports were a pain in her ass too.

“Thanks Thrace, but I don't think the old man would go for that, he seems to be a stickler for the paper versions.” He lent back in his seat and the stress became apparent.

“Well now would be a good time to eat then.” Kara threw him an energy bar. And he smiled at her as he began opening the bar.

“So what has brought you to making sure I eat, Kara. Not that I don't appreciate the effort of course,” he finished off at her glare, which softened into an enigmatic smile.

“Was thinking,” was all she offered up. Lee looked at her.

“That's a dangerous occupation for you Thrace. I remember you thinking that first night we met.” His eyes darkened a trace at the thought of her proposition whilst Zak lay semi conscious and half asleep on the sofa.

“Yeah, well its almost as bad what you say when you aren't thinking,” She countered. She look up seeing his frown. “I was remembering today, just before Zak died, when the Mark VII had just appeared, you were on shore leave that weekend and I had just come back from a test flight of the plane, seeing what it could do,” She left off seeing Lee as a slightly younger man.

“I remember that day. We were paralytic that night. You had a fascination with that Viper, you were gonna name her Betsy or some such the way you looked at it.” Lee laughed, tossing the wrapper to his energy bar on the desk.

“It was a he” She contested, “they all are.” She growled out playfully. Lee laughed louder.

“Why am I not surprised by this?” Kara glared.

“You were giving me hell about it then. Flying those birds was almost better than sex, I believe I made that comment then too.” She stopped for a moment and looked at Lee, who looked back at Kara, tension beginning to build in the room itself. “Then you said something, I don't think you meant for me to hear, something about how I hadn't had the best yet.” She held his gaze, the tips of his ears slightly tinged red and Kara sensed a victory in the offing.

Standing up she gave him the rest of his lunch from her now empty food tray. And took his empty wrapper. “Thing is, even then, even taking in your arrogance, I knew you were telling the truth.” It was a quietly said, a vestige of the freedom that mornings CAP had left with her. Lee remained silent letting her finish, not wanting to breath for fear of spooking her. Standing straighter she began walking to the hatch, before pausing, “So here is the deal Lee. Prove it, Dinner here, and then we'll see where it leads. 1900 seem fair.”

She continued walking, she opened the hatch door and walked out, closing it behind her. Lee watched her leave and sat staring shocked after her. Standing outside his office Kara smiled to herself. She knew he would be there. He'd been waiting too long for him not to be there.


End file.
